Tag Archives: detective

the retribution

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The Retribution (Carol Jordan and Tony Hill #7) by Val McDermid.

From Goodreads:

There is one serial killer who has shaped and defined police profiler Tony Hill’s life. One serial killer whose evil surpasses all others. One serial killer who has the power to chill him to the bone: Jacko Vance. And now Jacko is back in Tony’s life – even more twisted and cunning than ever before.

My Rating: 🌟 🌟 🌟

This book had a lot of potential. Carol and Tony are moving their lives to a new chapter and moving closer to a proper relationship, Jacko Vance breaks out of prison and there is another sicko serial killer on the loose. Somehow, however, the author manages none of the story lines particularly well.

Everything about this book is grand but it’s far from great. The twin stories of the new killer and Jacko’s revenge spree were very underdeveloped and really should have been two separate books while the ending was shockingly sudden and verging on ridiculous with Jacko. Both stories felt like the author ran out of time, especially with the new killer. This story just finished very abruptly. Add in the complete overreaction by Carol towards Tony and the overall story left a bad taste.

The saving grace of this book is the development of the secondary characters, especially Paula and Stacey. The second story line allowed for this but I really would have preferred to see this happen in a separate book.

It’s a step in the series and worth reading but the next instalment needs to be much better to rescue the series.

dead at first sight

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Dead at First Sight (Roy Grace #15) by Peter James.

From Goodreads:

A man waits at London Airport for Ingrid Ostermann, the love of his life, to arrive. Across the Atlantic, a retired NYPD cop waits in a bar in Florida’s Key West for his first date with the lady who is, without question, his soulmate. The two men are about to discover they’ve been scammed out of almost every penny they have—and that neither woman exists. Meanwhile, a wealthy divorcée plunges, in suspicious circumstances, from an apartment block in Munich. In the same week, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is called to investigate the suicide of a woman in Brighton, that is clearly not what it seems. As his investigations continue, a handsome Brighton motivational speaker comes forward. He’d discovered his identity is being used to scam 11 different women, online. Roy Grace realizes he is looking at the tip of an iceberg. A global empire built on clever, cruel internet scams and the murder of anyone who threatens to expose them.

My Rating: 🌟 🌟 🌟

I’ve read all of the other Roy Grace books and really enjoyed them. This one was a big disappointment, especially as I’ve been waiting a while to get a chance to read it.

The whole concept behind the story is definitely a huge issue but it’s not the type of story normally associated with Roy Grace. I found it hard to get invested in the victims and couldn’t really care less about them or their problems. The introduction of a typical old school, hard man criminal mastermind didn’t suit the story at all and the whole story and group of characters felt disjointed. I’m also fed up with the pointless story of Roy and Cleo’s adoption of Bruno. He’s obviously an obnoxious little git but the story arc has been dragged out to nowhere now for at least two books. The back story of Sandy’s disappearance was a good and unique story but it’s like the author introduced Bruno and now doesn’t know what to do with him.

I’ve looked forward to the next instalment in this series every time I’ve finished one of them but not this time. I would have given it two stars except for the increase in pace and the way he concluded the story in the last 15-20%.